HANS MEMLING: PORTRAIT OF A YOUNG WOMAN Poem by Willem van Toorn

Maybe Maria Moreel. We see her, at least.
She's held safe in her frame, too chaste
for words. So pale and burgerlijk, so
aloof and distantly well-to-do

that someone later went and gave her
the name of Sibyl. Wished it on her, rather -
thought her to Persia, so mythically far
that we can't reach her any more.

But she just wants to be here. Her hand - see
how it lies over the frame, as if she's been
waiting beside a stiff window that opens
suddenly, centuries later, into this moment.